ibetans in Kathmandu, once a safe haven for refugees and still a nexus of Tibetan culture, religion and commerce, endure constant harassment, random search and arrest by both Nepali police and Chinese agents.

"Chinese agents are shaking down businessmen and paying cops to harass Tibetans. It’s hard to know how the Tibetans can survive when the Chinese are treating us like they own us. In the border regions, police are making house-to-house raids looking for Dalai Lama photos

China is now claiming suzerainty over all Tibetan Buddhist ethnic and cultural zones, which span the Himalayan Belt of Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan, Ladakh and Arunachal Pradesh in India, as it advances its hegemonic ambitions in South and Southeast Asia with a bellicosity that could hardly be categorized as “soft power.” Chinese engineers are advancing into Nepal from Tibet, building roads and monopolizing trade with a strategic advantage that no amount of western aid or international press coverage can possibly counter.

Chinese security forces are well established all along the Tibet-Nepal border. Since the 2008 Lhasa Uprising, the Chinese military has sealed off most of the mountain passes linking Tibet and Nepal, which has drastically reduced the number of new escapees. Tibetans are at great risk of capture and refoulement at the Nepal-Tibet border with no international monitoring or protection and negligible media coverage.

Said a Tibetan businessman born in Kathmandu: “Nepal has become a second Tibet. No one is safe anymore; we have no leadership and no voice in the government. We used to have an office managed by the Dalai Lama’s exile administration and had the protection of the monarchy, but both are gone.”

For decades, Tibetans operated hotels, boutiques and restaurants, and were Nepal’s first industrialists, building carpet factories that employed tens of thousands of Nepali workers and brought wealth to the Kathmandu Valley. Exiled Tibetan lamas built monasteries across Nepal, which draw pilgrims and students from across the globe and young Buddhist monks from Nepal’s northern regions. The “Tibet Brand” brings tens of thousands of pilgrims and tourists to Nepal every year. Nepalis can sell Tibetan flags, tee shirts and posters, but Tibetan businessmen are threatened with extortion for hanging a photograph of HH Dalai Lama in an office or hotel lobby.

Since the 1990’s, when the Maoist insurgency began, Nepal’s Maoists have targeted Tibetan businesses with extortion and assault, forcing many to close, depriving hundreds of thousands of Nepal workers of employment, mostly in the Tibetan carpet industry, which for decades was Nepal’s largest source of capital and international trade.

Officials from the US Embassy, UNHCR, the Indian Embassy and Nepali government all concur that Chinese pressure, through military exchanges, aid donations and bribery, has been highly successful in isolating and weakening the Tibetan community in Nepal. Yang Houlan, the current Chinese ambassador to Nepal, has issued several press releases stating that Nepal must be “cleansed of anti-Chinese elements”. His embassy is exerting extreme pressure upon Nepal’s fragile government to deny Tibetans any kind of legal residency status, to restrict all Tibetan economic and cultural activities, to the prevent Tibetan escapees from crossing the Nepal border.

Nepal is between a rock and a hard place. On one hand it is economically dependent on India as all the nation's oil comes from India while on the other hand they have China with their own interests and motives at work. Nepal is extremely valuable to both India and China. Depending on who it allies with it would determine the balance of power in the Himalayas. At the moment I think a lot of Nepalis have mixed feelings about both. Both India and China interfere with domestic issues in Nepal despite claiming to respect its sovereignty.

Blue Garuda wrote:What the world really does not need is escalation of a cold war between India and China with another powder keg dispute ready to ignite into violence.

It is already happening.

I recently read about India wanting to station another armoured division in Ladakh. India is also seeking to spend billions in upgrading its military. This is clearly to confront not just Pakistan, but China as well. India also recently announced it was seeking to build a fleet of nuclear submarines. China on the other side is also considerably building up its military.